Hearthpwn

For reference, my highest finish is Legend 800.

I would consider everyone who reaches rank 5 "good" - they have understood the game mechanics and can execute their deck well. For me, the really good (pro) players are those who reach Legend with ease (meaning they can reach it with non-Tier 1 deck) and finish at least around Legend 100.

I built a different Aluneth Mage that stands 11-1 vs. Big Priest (75% Winrate overall from Rank 17-4) and doesn't run Loatheb: https://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/1270334-wild-aluneth-aggro-mage

He will be part of Murloc Shaman for sure, which is Tier 2, according to HSreplay. So I'd say keep the card

This is wrong. Six of the weapons were pretty good and saw play for a while. Let's go through all 9 classes.

Mage: Aluneth saw play in Burn/Tempo Mages. / Priest: That one was garbage. / Warlock: As you mentioned, Skull was OP. / Rogue: Kingsbane Rogue got nerfed, because of how annoying the weapon was in wild. / Druid: Saw play in Maly & Togwagle Druid. / Shaman: A meme, for sure. / Warrior: Recruit Warrior was like Tier3, I guess that counts for not viable. / Paladin: It was played in Even Paladin, even though it is a tech choice. / Hunter: Afaik Spell Hunter is okayish.

Imo the problem with even mage is that there is no real route it can go without being outclassed by other mage decks.

You won't really go the aggro route, because the Odd Mage Hero Power is just better for smorcing. Aggro decks tend to not use their hero power in the early game until they have spare mana, where 2 Damage for 2 Mana is just better than 1 for 1.

A control mage will always want to use Jaina.

Your best bet is probably a Midrange Mage that uses the Hero Power for early and cheap board control, but then again Midrange Decks aren't in the best spot atm and in most cases having a 3 drop on turn 3 is better than a 2drop + a ping (same goes for turn 5 and 7).

I just got my first 12 Win run in Arena!

T2 this into ramp